Surat Court's Order Brings Back A Familiar Problem For Opposition — Over-Emphasis On Rahul Gandhi In Popular Narrative

At a TV debate in 2015, Gardiner Harris of The New York Times said Congress would die if they continue to project Rahul Gandhi as their leader. 

The Congress didn’t listen to it; and neither could the party convince the Gandhi scion that it was not within his capacity to counter a leader like Prime Minister Narendra Modi. 

Today, not only Congress but the entire opposition politics is suffering from an over-emphasis on Rahul Gandhi. If ‘democracy is in danger’, as Rahul prefers to point out, it is due to a lack of quality debates in the opposition.  

Chances are, his disqualification from the Parliament will add to the undue glorification of Rahul in the media space and would further limit the horizon for Opposition politics. The BJP will be the ultimate gainer. 

At each other’s throats

To start with, if the opposition parties stood by Rahul on the disqualification cause, that’s merely to exploit the opportunity and protect their backs. 

From the teacher recruitment scam in West Bengal or the excise policy scandal of the Delhi government, there are too many skeletons in the opposition camp. 

However, it would be naïve to expect them to leave an inch to Congress or Rahul in the election(s). AAP rose to power in Punjab at the expense of Congress. Trinamool poached Congress MLAs to gain a foothold in Meghalaya and Goa. 

“Opposition leaders have become the prime target of BJP!” West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said on March 24 on Rahul’s disqualification. A week ago, she had reportedly told partymen that the Congress leader became PM Modi's "biggest TRP.” 

The primary problem lies in the fact that the opposition brigade is looking for a slice of the same anti-Modi vote bank, most importantly the minority votes. 

A powerful Congress would mean a loss of strength for Trinamool in West Bengal and fresh worries for the Samajwadi Party in Uttar Pradesh. Any such situation would improve BJP’s fortunes in these two states. 

To offer a sound alternative to BJP at the Centre, the Congress, therefore, was required to expand its constituencies among the majority. 

Leaving the rhetoric apart, there is no proof that Congress could do that. However, the entire pro-Rahul machinery is out to prove him a mass leader. 

So much has been spoken about the "success" of Rahul’s ‘Bharat Jodo Yatra'. But if he was right about his assessment, why did Congress lose so miserably in so many states, in the recent spate of elections - from Gujarat to Tripura?  

If Congress wins in Karnataka – which is possible – fans will attribute it to Rahul Gandhi’s leadership, not to the campaign of the state unit and leadership. Notably, the Siddaramaiah government lost the 2018 election, with Rahul leading the show. 

Rahul or Congress?

There is a wide gap between crowd rallies and votes. The CPI(M) organised several successful rallies in West Bengal over the last decade. But, each election saw their vote share declining. 

As Chief Minister of Gujarat, Narendra Modi didn’t go on a walkathon around the country. His governance spoke for him. His electricity sector reforms attracted national attention. Gujarat became highly energy secure in his leadership. Investors from around the world started pouring billions of dollars into the state. 

Modi ran Gujarat for 13 years, before appearing on the national scene in 2014 with a report card on one hand and a clear strategy on the other. And, since then he remained the darling of the Indian electorate. This is a record of sorts. 

In contrast, Rahul Gandhi didn’t even run a municipality. He handled the responsibility of party president for one and a half years between 2017 and 2019 and never shouldered the blame for the party’s poor show for nine long years. 

Yet, his supporters pitched Rahul against Prime Minister Modi – the vote-machine of the BJP. How fair is that? 

Rahul spends most of his time speaking on democracy or the lack of it. The rest of his speeches are filled with sweeping comments about the economy - many of which are half-baked – and some laughable observations (like the comment in London on diplomat-turned foreign minister S Jaishankar’s understanding of international affairs).

Does Congress really feel that this is enough to counter Modi’s superman image, the Prime Minister’s proven leadership qualities, and BJP’s politics to create a wider audience, cutting across caste and religious boundaries? 

The Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) had one of the most loyal support bases ever since it was born. That edge has been lost since 2014. Christians from Tripura voted for BJP in 2018 and 2019. A similar trend was also noticed in Kerala. 

The northeastern region of the country was known for ethnicity-driven, tribal politics. It would be wrong to attribute BJP’s advances there to ‘money power.’ Modi triggered a social, political and economic revolution in that region. 

On democracy, one can simply check the number of times the Modi government used its dominant majority to turn court verdicts upside down or imposed President’s Rule in states vis-à-vis Congress governments. 

The scope for a more erudite debate on the subject is reserved for Salvatore Babones. 

Limiting the scope for debate

Modi has changed Indian politics. Call it the American or Chinese dream; the majority of Indians are now gripped by a strong nationalist spirit. They want to see their country outbidding others. 

It was an opportunity for Congress to pick up the nationalist and reformist hat. It was a nationalist party before being run over by the Leftists.  

It is impossible to challenge PM Modi’s popularity at this juncture. But it was possible for a non-BJP state to give Yogi Adityanath’s Uttar Pradesh competition in governance and development. 

Naveen Patnaik is doing exactly that in Odisha. 

Congress gave this opportunity a miss. They failed to create a distinct space for themselves in national politics. Their politics is similar to that of the regional parties, who have more flexibility in the opposition. 

Forget reforms, Congress is today giving Left and AAP competition in offering freebies. They pioneered the retrograde step of introducing the old pension scheme in states. The price will be paid by the future generation. 

Less said on 'nationalism', the better. The AAP was clever to change tack from the Pulwama episode. The Congress, however, demanded “proof” of the Balakot airstrike that brought a paradigm shift in the power balance in the sub-continent.  

All these are not auguring well for the nation. 

A lot of things have happened around the world over the last few days. Delhi took a strong exception to the vandalism at Indian missions abroad, particularly in the UK. 

From the USA, the banking crisis has spread into Europe, igniting fears of another financial crisis. The latest rate hike by the US Federal Reserve may squeeze global monetary space and lead to a market crash. 

Any such possibility will limit India’s growth prospects. The opposition should debate the pros and cons and help the country draw a fall-back plan. 

But, Indian Parliament remained captive to Rahul Gandhi - his visions, allegations and, disqualification.

It doesn’t matter that he could apologise to the Surat court for his deplorable remarks and avoid such eventualities. It doesn’t matter that either he was wrongly advised on the court case or he didn’t pay heed to sane advice. 

It barely matters that dozens of MPs and MLAs (including some from BJP) were disqualified under the same Representation of the People Act, in the past, as BJP’s Ravi Shankar Prasad pointed out in a press conference.

Rahul might get a breather from the higher court on the disqualification issue. Congress may win in Karnataka. But will the opposition political space remain cluttered by the useless Modi or Rahul debate? It is easy to guess who will benefit from it.